AIRA Villegas pumped back life to Philippine boxing’s campaign in the Paris Olympics after securing a podium finish and a place in the semifinals by eking out a thrilling split decision win against French opponent Wassila Lkhadiri early Sunday morning.
The pride of Tacloban City bucked a hostile home crowd at the North Paris Arena by finishing strong in the make-or-break third round, and take a close 3-2 win in the quarterfinals of the women’s flyweight class.
Fighting in her first Olympics, Villegas was reduced to tears and proudly showed off her blue-colored Philippine jersey when she was announced the winner after the tightly-fought match amidst the wild jeering of the flag-waving Frenchmen.
The win came just hours after medal bet Carlo Paalam lost a 3-2 heartbreaker against Charlie Senior of Australia in the men’s featherweight quarterfinals.
Paalam was seeking to upgrade on his silver medal finish in the Tokyo Olympics where he campaigned as a flyweight.
It was the second time Villegas disposed a top seeded opponent in this Olympics. Earlier, she showed the door on no. 2 rated Roumaysa Boualam of Algeria, 5-0, in the round-of-16.
No.3 seed Buse Naz Cakiroglu of Turkey is up next for the 29-year-old Filipina as they tangle on August 7 at 4:15 p.m. (Manila time). The Turkish shutout Pihla Kaivo-oja of Finland, 5-0.
Tokyo Olympic silver medalist Nesthy Petecio will try to follow in the footsteps of Villegas as she also seeks a place in the semis and a bronze medal in the women’s featherweight class when she goes up against XU Zichun of China at 9:30 p.m. on Sunday (Manila time).
Villegas took the opening round by a close margin behind an impressive footwork and jabbing her way against the crowd favorite.
But Lkhadiri fought back in the second round by cutting the distance between her and Villegas, who suddenly abandoned her fight plan of continuous moving in the ring that allowed her French foe to equalize the scorecards heading to the final round.
The Filipina scored the cleaner punches in the third, although Lkhadiri also had her moments that made the fight go either way.
In the end, the judges favored Villegas, who slumped on both knees and hollered and cried following yet the biggest win of her boxing career.
Lkhadiri was also reduced to tears, stunned by the turn of events that saw a second French fighter losing to a Filipina opponent.
The other day, Petecio made it to the quarterfinals by rallying past French foe Amina Zidani, 4-1.
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